


After the Battle

by nightwalker



Category: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Bay Movies), Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - All Media Types
Genre: April isn't sure how she ended up here but it's good, Big Brother Leonardo (TMNT), Brother Feels, Domestic Fluff, Family Bonding, Family Feels, Gen, Healing, Hurt Raphael, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Canon, Raphael is a Little Shit, They're all coping pretty well considering the day they've had, donatello is team medic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-10
Updated: 2018-11-10
Packaged: 2019-08-21 18:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16581569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightwalker/pseuds/nightwalker
Summary: They've stopped the Shredder, they've saved the day, all that's left is to put each other back together again.





	After the Battle

**Author's Note:**

  * For [amaronith](https://archiveofourown.org/users/amaronith/gifts).



> Warnings: There is talk of medical treatment in this fic. No blood and no gore, but they have to fix Raph's broken shell
> 
> This is a gift fic for Amaronith who had a bad day and asked for team bonding fic. Admittedly she asked, like, a month ago and I think she wanted Avengers fic but hopefully this will do.

April was more than halfway to the lair before she realized this was probably not as good an idea as it had seemed.

The tunnels was longer than she remembered, or maybe she was just running on empty after the craziness of the day. She’d felt fine after leaving the hospital earlier, but her legs were getting a little wobbly and she wasn’t walking so much as… well. Trudging. She was trudging through the sewers with two huge bags of takeout toward the ruined home of a bunch of mutants she’d only met a couple days ago and who - now that she thought of it - might not even be there anymore since their worst enemies now knew where they lived.

Well, not like she could have called ahead. Did they have phones? She felt like they must have phones, but it wasn’t like they’d gotten around to exchanging numbers or anything.

“Well, worst case scenario, I don’t have to cook for a few days.” April rearranged her grip on the takeout - she may, possibly, have gone slightly overboard but damnit, they were seven foot tall _teenage boys_ she suspected a small grocery store wouldn’t have been enough.

The entrance to the lair came into sight just as she realized she was starting to list slightly to one side. Yeah, the doctor had totally been on track with that whole “go home and rest” thing.

She paused just outside the lair, suddenly hesitant. Not so much of her welcome - she thought they were friends now, if nothing else and if Leo and the others didn’t want her to know where they were then she never would have seen the place. But they were fighters and they’d already been ambushed in their own home once today. She didn’t want to startle anyone and catch a fist - or a sword - in the face. “Guys?” she called.

“Hey, April.” Leo didn’t sound surprised to hear from her - but then, she realized a little ruefully, she’d probably made a ton of noise slogging her way through the tunnel. They’d have heard her coming a ways back. “We’re back here.”

She carefully stepped into the lair, wincing slightly at the sight of the damage done by the Foot. “It’s going to take forever to clean this place up.”

Leo laughed, but it was a tired, breathless huff. “If not longer.” He was leaning against the door of a room that April thought may have been Donnie’s workshop, and he looked like the brick wall was the only thing keeping him on his feet. “When Don’s had a chance to rest up we’ll see what’s worth salvaging, but until then we’re just going to have to live with the mess.”

April shifted the bags in her arms and picked her way across the rubble toward him. “How’s Splinter?”

“Sleeping now, but he should be fine when he wakes up.” The expression of naked relief on Leo’s face made him look young and vulnerable in a way she wasn’t used to - and reminded her all over again that the guys really were just kids. “Everyone should be fine after a little rest.”

“And dinner.” April hefted the bags. “I didn’t know what shape your kitchen would be in so I thought I’d bring you guys something to eat. The internet said red meat and leafy greens were good for anemia and blood loss, so steaks it is.” A thought occurred to her. “Do you guys eat steak?”

“We’re sixteen,” Leo said with crooked grin, “we eat everything. Especially Mikey.”

“That does not surprise me,” April said. “Where can I put this?”

Leo blinked and then looked around the ruined space for a moment. “Uhhh-”

“Hey, Leo.” Raph’s voice came from the room behind him, low, but pitched to carry. “Little help here?”

“Raph?” Alarm is thick in Leo’s voice as he ducks back into the room, and April runs in after him. “What is it? Are you okay? Is it your-” Leo paused. “Okay, that’s adorable.”

April ducked around him and took in the sight. “Yeah, he’s right. Let me get my phone. I need a picture of this.”

Raph made a sound that could have been a growl. “Guys.”

He was sitting on what looked like an ottoman or a footrest - or had been before it was set on fire at some point. His back was to the door and April got her first good look at what Shredder had done to his shell without the duct tape covering it. The crack looked painful up close, a solid inch of space between the edges of the shell and she had to hold back a wince at the thought of what that would feel like. For some reason she kept thinking of the time she’d torn off a fingernail, but that seemed pale in comparison. 

Donatello was sitting on a chair behind him with a first aid kit open on the table next to him. He’d obviously started to work on patching Raph up, but fallen asleep at some point, slumped forward with his head resting against Raph’s shell. Michelangelo was sitting on the floor in front of Raph, possibly to hold him still while Don worked, and he had his arms crossed on top of Raph’s knees, head resting on his arms, snoring gently.

“I think dimwit and boy genius here hit a wall,” Raph said. He was leaning forward a little, hands braced on the seat beside his legs, and he looked paler than usual. “Help me get them up, I don’t wanna dump them on the floor.”

Leo grabbed Mikey under his arms and just pulled him back against the wall a few feet away from where he’d been sitting. Mikey didn’t so much as twitch at being manhandled, though he did squirm slightly when Leo came back and dumped a throw blanket over his lap.

April set the food down on the table, careful not to jostle anything that had managed to survive the fight. “Do you need a hand?”

“Not yet.” Leo hunkered down next to Donnie’s chair and shook his brother’s shoulder very gently. “Hey. Come on, bro, I need you to wake up.”

Don drew in a deep breath that made his entire body move, but sat up. “What? Leo, I- Oh geez, Raph, sorry.”

“It’s all good. You’re running on half a tank right now, we’re lucky you didn’t fall on your face as soon as we got home.” Raph’s voice was almost unexpectedly gentle. “Think you can stand up?”

“Yeah, but not yet.” Don shook his head a little. “I’m almost done with this, give me about ten more minutes and then we can both go crash.”

“No arguing,” Leo said and Raphael snapped his mouth shut. “We can’t leave a wound like that untreated. Let him finish, and then April brought us dinner.”

Raph flashed her a grin. “I could smell it as soon as you walked in.”

Donatello rolled his shoulders. “Okay, I am suddenly _starving_. Let’s get this done. Leo would you grab the drummel saw?”

“Okay, wait, what?” April took a step forward, then paused, hands up in front of her, even though she had no idea what she thought she was going to do with them. “A _saw_?”

“The edges of the shell are caught under each other here,” Don said, hovering his hand over a spot about midway along the crack in Raph’s shell. “I need to sand it down a little so the shell can move back into the correct position and heal properly. Right now it’s causing pressure on part of the wound and it could actually result in further cracking if we don’t release it.”

“But a saw? Won’t that hurt?”

Raph shrugged a little, then winced. “Yeah, but it’ll mostly be the vibrations.” 

“It’s like fingernails, I guess?” Leo said. “The bone and flesh underneath hurts, if the wound goes deep enough.”

“The wound here goes pretty deep,” Don said. “Leo, would you mind taking over for Mikey?”

“You got it.” Leo positioned himself in front of Raph and then squatted down till he was balanced on the balls of his feet. He leaned forward and wrapped his hands around Raph’s wrists, clearly planning to hold him in place. “You good?”

“I’m good. Go on, get it over with.”

The whine of the saw was almost shockingly loud and April flinched a little as it kicked in. Raph flinched too, hands curling into fists as he fought to keep from moving. Leo leaned forward and pressed his forehead against Raph’s. He said something April couldn’t hear over the sound of the saw, but it wasn’t meant for her anyway. 

The smell of Raph’s shell getting sawed away was something that was going to stick with her for a few days.

Donatello grimaced slightly, but kept working. It only took a few moments, and then Donnie set the saw aside. “Bro, you know I love you.”

“Just do it,” Raph said. “Don’t give me any warning, just-”

Don reached over and pressed down, hard, on one section of Raph’s shell. There was a moment where nothing happened, then it seemed to move back into place with a sound like joints popping.

Raph sucked in breath through clenched teeth, and Leo’s knuckles went white around his wrists, but he didn’t move. “Holy shit.”

“Swear jar,” Leo said automatically.

“Oh fuck off,” Raph said.

“Sorry, sorry.” Don laid a hand on Raph’s shoulder for a moment. “Okay, we’re almost done with the bad part.”

“Bad part?” April asked.

Donnie was moving fast now, grabbing a couple of bottles. One of them was a jug of filtered grocery store water, which he uncapped and poured a small stream of it into the wound.

Raph definitely flinched that time, eyes clenched shut, forehead pressed against Leo’s so hard it was probably not that far from being head butted. Leo, for his part, didn’t move at all. “You’re doing good, he’s almost done.”

“April,” Donnie said. “Can you hand me that light?” He gestured toward the table and April blinked at it’s contents for a moment before she saw the headlamp and grabbed it. He strapped it on and aimed the light into the wound. “Okay, the good news is, nothing looks inflamed or infected yet. The bad news is there’s some shell fragments and broken glass in there that we need to get cleaned out.” He grimaced a little and rested one hand flat against Raph’s shell. “Probably from when I threw you into that truck.”

“Truck?” Leo said. “What truck? Did I miss this?” 

“I think you were still unconscious at that point,” Don said. “All right, April can you hand me that pan there? With the instruments?”

There was a white metal pan full of alcohol with several pieces of medical equipment soaking in it. She held it out so Donnie could reach and he plucked out what looked like a pair of elongated tweezers. Just the sight of it made her back hurt in sympathy. “Try not to move, okay, Raphie?” The almost childish nickname sounded soft in Donnie’s gentle voice and April was hit all over again with the realization that they were _kids_. “Let me know if you need me to take a break.”

“Just do it.” Raph’s eyes were open and locked onto Leo’s. “Come on, Donnie, before you fall asleep on me again.”

He sounded gruff, but there was a thread of amusement running through his voice, even as his hands clenched tight into the material of the ottoman. April didn’t know how he could do it. She wasn’t even the one hurt and just the idea of what Don was about to do made her want to curl into a little ball. 

“All right, we got this.” Leo butted his head against Raph’s gently. “Go on, Donnie.”

“Try to stay still,” Don said again. He still had one hand pressed flat against his brother’s back and he took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “April, could I impose upon you to grab an empty bowl or something?” 

There was an empty coffee cup within grabbing distance. April held it out for his approval and Don nodded. “Can you hold that for me? I need somewhere to put the glass after I remove it. Please hold it steady, we don’t want the instrument to touch the cup. I can’t risk any cross-contamination of the wound or there’s a real risk of infection.”

April tightened her grip on the mug. “I understand.”

The next few minutes were almost hard to watch. Raph was obviously in pain - his grip on the ottoman was so tight that April could hear the material creak and start to rip, and the muscles in his shoulders and neck were so tense it looked like the were going to burst. Donnie was clearly aware that his actions were causing his brother discomfort; he grimaced and winced when Raph couldn’t hold back a pained sound, and he closed his eyes briefly when Raph bit back a scream as Don removed one particularly large shard of glass. But his hand never shook and his movements remained precise and efficient, pausing briefly on the moments when Raph flinched and then going right back to work.

Leo kept up a steady stream of words in a calm, even voice. April could barely hear him but it sounded like everyday nonsense for the most part. What they needed to do to repair the damage to their home, where they were going to replace some of their belongings, whose turn it was to restock the kitchen. It seemed to be working, at least as much as possible. Raph seemed to be focusing on what Leo said, and even bit out one or two word answers when Leo asked him questions.

“Almost done,” Donnie said. He dropped a small fragment of shell into the mug and gave the wound a long, close look. “You’re doing great, thank you.”

“Anything to make this easier on you,” Raph said dryly.

Donnie gestured at April to catch her attention. He tapped a finger against his mouth to signal for silence. She nodded, mouth curving into an involuntary frown. He pointed at the table behind her and she followed his gaze to the bottle of disinfectant. Oh. She winced, and grabbed the bottle, passing it to Don silently. Leo watched them both without a flicker of acknowledgement, then turned his gaze back to Raph.

“I’m just checking to make sure I didn’t miss anything,” Donnie said. He kept his voice calm as he hurriedly unscrewed the lid on the disinfectant. “I don’t want to risk this healing up around a piece of glass or debris and then having to crack it back open in a few months or years. That would pose a significant threat to your health, not to mention your immune system with the increased risk of infection, and frankly I don’t think either one of us wants me to have to literally take a hammer and chisel to what is, essentially, your spine.”

Raph managed a rough laugh. “Yeah, that sounds like a terrible-”

Donnie stood, planted one hand on the back of Raph’s neck and held him down while he used the other to upend the bottle of disinfectant into the wound. 

If Raph had flinched at the water, his whole body spasmed as the alcohol hit him. Donnie and Leo both pushed him back into his seat, Leo with a constant stream of reassurances and Don chanting “sorry, sorry, sorry” over and over as he kept pouring the liquid out until it was gone.

Raph didn’t scream, which might actually have been better. Instead he gasped for breath, so hard April thought his throat must hurt. He’d released his grip on the ottoman when the alcohol hit him and now had his hands wrapped around Leo’s wrists. Leo’s arms were shaking with the strength of holding Raph in place and for a second April thought Raph might throw one or both of his brothers off.

There was a long moment where the three of them stayed like that, Donnie pressed against Raph’s side, one hand still holding the back of his brother’s neck, Leo holding Raph’s hands in a white-knuckled grip, Raph gasping for breath, every muscle in his body tense. April waited, still, silent, not wanting to break the moment.

“Sorry,” Donnie said again. His grip on Raph’s neck loosened, and he stroked over the tight skin with his thumb. Soothing. Reassuring. Apologetic. “I’m really sorry. I thought it might be easier if you didn’t know it was coming.”

Raph had his eyes closed, but he turned his head just enough to press his temple against Donnie’s chest. “All right, genius. Let’s just get this over with.”

“We’re almost done.” Donnie sounded exhausted suddenly, and he scrubbed a hand over his face before he took his seat at Raphael’s back again. “Okay, this is the easy part. I’m going to let this dry for a minute, and then I just need to layer on the fiberglass and epoxy.”

“Fiberglass?” April said, then mentally slapped herself as all three of them turned to look at her. Raph, she could tell, had all but forgotten she was there. 

“Yeah, the crack in the shell is too wide - trying to force the edges back together would hurt like hell and probably just do more damage than it’s worth. So instead we’ll cover it with fiberglass cloths, seal the whole thing with a waterproof epoxy, and let it heal itself. It’ll take a while,” Don added, his tone cautionary and very clearly aimed at Raph. “If we were regular turtles, this would take years or more to heal.”

“If we were regular turtles we wouldn’t be sitting here havin’ this conversation,” Raph said. A lot of the tension had gone out of him and he’d let go of his deathgrip on Leo’s wrists. “How long do you think it’ll take?”

“At least a few weeks before you can risk getting hurt again,” Don said. He was sitting with his forearms braced on his thighs and his skin was going slightly gray. He’d been running on nothing but a truly inadvisable amount of adrenaline for almost a day now. “No combat, no risky stunts, and no strenuous training. It’s katas and meditation for you until I say otherwise.”

“Oh, come _on_ -”

“No.” Don’s voice came out sharp and Leo and Raph both blinked at him, the same surprise on their faces that April felt. “You’re going to listen to me and take care of yourself _for once in your life._ ”

“Don’t go all mother-hen on me,” Raph said. And maybe it was the adrenaline crash or hunger or exhaustion, but April could hear an edge of irritation in his tone that seemed in deliberate contrast to the way he’d spoken to his brothers before. “I’ve been hurt worse than this, I don’t know why you’re getting your shell in a wad-”

“ _Because I thought you were dead!_ ”

April almost jumped at the sudden shout, a sudden rush of - not fear, exactly, she’d known Donnie two days and was already pretty sure he’d never hurt anyone who didn’t deserve it. But it had been a long day and people had tried to kill her a lot so she didn’t think she could really be blamed for being started by loud, angry yelling.

Leo didn’t bat an eye, but Raph did jerk a little, more in surprise than anything else, and he twisted slightly on his seat so he could see his brother. “Hey-”

“Don’t you “hey” me,” Donatello snapped. He was glaring at his brother, and if he realized the headlamp was shining directly in Raph’s face, he didn’t seem to care for the moment. “You went up to the fan room and you didn’t come back. And they said you were dead - and I thought it was a trick at first, but they didn’t try to dig you out, they just _left you there_. And for six fucking hours in the back of that truck, and locked up in that cage, I thought you were dead. We _all_ thought you and sensei were dead. So don’t give me your usual bull and just-” He snapped his mouth shut and scrubbed both hands over his face, almost knocking the headlamp off.

“Donnie.” Raph lifted one hand and Leo let go so he could reach behind him and hook his fingers around Don’s wrist. “I’m all right. Sensei, too.”

“I really thought you were dead,” Don said again. He wasn’t yelling, but he was staring at the back of Raph’s shell, eyes on the thick, ugly crack. “And then you showed up out of nowhere and I could hear you fighting and Vern was yelling that Shredder was killing you and I couldn’t do anything.” He dragged in a deep breath. “But I can do this, and you’re going to take care of yourself because I haven’t processed losing you once and I absolutely am not going to do it again anytime soon. So no combat. No training. You need to rest and heal and you’ll do it if I have to tie you to your bed.”

“Kinky,” Michelangelo said, voice slurred with sleep. “Donnie and Raph, sitting in a tree-”

“Somebody knock him back out, please,” Raph said.

“If Mikey is awake enough to offer commentary, he can go help April set up dinner,” Leo said. 

Mikey groaned somewhat pitiably, but didn’t even try to argue with the sharp tone of Leo’s voice. He did need a couple tries to get up off the floor, and looked a little unsteady once he gained his feet, but he dragged in a deep breath and rolled his neck and nodded. “Should I wake dad?”

He was asking Leo, but Leo looked to Donnie, who shrugged. “If he doesn’t wake up easy, leave him to rest. But if he’s mostly awake anyway, some food wouldn’t hurt.”

“Got it.” Mike yawned so hard his jaw cracked. “Whatcha need, April?”

“Show me where I can set this up?” April grabbed one of the bags and passed it to him.

“Sorry,” she could hear Don say. “I didn’t mean to yell.”

Whatever Raphael said was too soft for her to hear over Mikey’s jaw-cracking yawn, or the sound of the bags rustling as she followed him to the living room.

There was a coffee table that survived more or less intact, if somewhat dirty. April rummaged around in the largely intact kitchen for a minute and came up with some clorox wipes. Mikey was more or less dozing on his feet with a bag of food in each arm while she cleaned it off and he jumped half a foot in the air when she took the bags from him. “Go get your dad,” she said. “I’ve got this.”

She did - it was nothing major, but setting out the food and plastic utensils felt like helping and she didn’t realize how much she needed to feel like she was doing some good until that moment. She had the food spread out on the table - five ten-ounce prime ribs and five eight-ounce sirloins, five baked potatoes heaped with butter and scallions (no bacon, because she’d had a weird panicky moment of _could turtles eat bacon?_ that had almost had her hyperventilating in the takeout line. Honestly, she probably really needed to get some sleep) and five sides of broccoli and cheese because vegetables had to be a good idea right now. There was also a giant tub of five-bean salad because the internet said that was good for anemia, and a jug of orange juice because that was what they gave you when you donated blood so it had to do something. And bottled waters because orange juice probably didn’t go well with steak.

“Oh, hey, this looks great.” Raph was walking toward her, one arm over Don’s shoulders, the other over Leo’s. He looked pretty steady so it was probably more for reassurance than anything else. “What’s everyone else going to eat?”

Leo rolled his eyes at him and pulled away to collect a few of the seat cushions from the couch that had survived the fight. He spread them out around the coffee table, handing the cleanest one to April which she wasn’t too proud to accept.

Raph dropped to the ground on the closest cushion and planted his elbows on the table. “Shit, April, this looks amazing.”

“Raphael.” Splinter’s voice was still hoarse, but it carried clearly across the lair. “Language.”

Donnie snickered and Leo covered his mouth with both his hands. Raphael sighed. “Yes, dad. Swear jar. I know.”

“Teenagers,” Splinter muttered under his breath. He was moving stiffly, one hand resting on Mike’s elbow, but he was mostly moving under his own power. “Thank Miss O’Neal properly, please, my sons.”

“Don’t thank me,” April said. “It was the least I could do. I’m just… really glad that everyone’s all right.”

“Thanks to you,” Leo said. “We owe you big time, April. You’re welcome here anytime, I hope you know that.”

“Well, not _here_ ,” Donatello said absently. He was eyeing one of the steaks with a look on his face that April thought was probably usually reserved for complicated science equipment or brand new computer parts. “But wherever we end up, we’ll definitely give you our forwarding address.” There was a sudden silence around the table and he looked up to see the other five all staring at him. “What?” he said. Then, “ _Guys_ , the Shredder and half the Foot Clan were standing, like, five feet away from where we’re sitting. You can’t possibly think it’s safe to stay here.”

Michelangelo made a low-pitched whining sound. “I don’t wanna move.”

Raphael shoved one of the containers across the table at him. “Shut up and eat your steak. We’ll deal with it in the morning.”

“Yes,” Splinter said serenely. “Shut up and eat your steaks, my sons. We will deal with tomorrow when it comes.”

****

At some point April must have fallen asleep because the next thing she knew, Splinter was draping a blanket over her.

She blinked at him, eyes a little fuzzy, head a lot fuzzy. “Huh?”

“Go back to sleep,” Splinter said, his voice soft and hushed and pitched not to carry further than the distance between them. “It is late and you need rest.”

April scrubs a hand over her mouth. “The guys?” She’s not sure what exactly she’s asking about, but it seems like something she should say.

Splinter gestured to the other side of the table and April had to blink a few more times before she realized what she was seeing. At some point Raphael had fallen asleep face down on the couch cushions, and Donnie was using one of his legs as a pillow. Leo was propped up against the couch itself, with Mike leaning against him, his head on Leo’s shoulder. One of Leo’s hands was resting on the back of Raph’s shoulder, linking them all together. Someone was snoring softly. 

“Go back to sleep,” Splinter said. “The boys will take you home in the morning.”

“Oh. Okay.” April dropped her head to her arms again. The cushion beneath her smelled slightly of smoke, but she couldn’t work up the energy to care about it just yet. “Can I come back? When you guys find a new place?”

There was a brief silence, during which she mostly fell asleep again. Then the blanket shifted a little as Splinter straightened it over her shoulders and a gentle voice said, “You are always welcome in our home, child.”

“Good,” April said. Keeping her eyes open was too hard, so she closed them. “Cause I was going to keep showing up anyway.”

“Bring more steaks,” Raphael said, his voice muffled by the cushions. 

April huffed a laugh, heard Mikey’s tired whine and Don’s sleepy grumbling, Leo’s irritated voice shushing them all. From above her she heard Splinter’s deep sigh - more fond than exasperated - and she laughed again, tired and breathless and relieved.

She’d been wrong. This had been a _great_ idea.

Steaks were too expensive though, especially on her new salary. Hopefully the guys liked pizza.


End file.
